


her eyes are hollow (but she looks like me)

by jdphoenix



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Episode: s03e21 Absolution, oneshot with additions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-11
Updated: 2016-10-21
Packaged: 2018-07-14 11:44:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7169648
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdphoenix/pseuds/jdphoenix
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jemma is very smart and very clever and it doesn’t take a genius to realize Hive is ahead of them. He’s used Daisy’s knowledge of SHIELD’s infrastructure to secret a time bomb holding Radcliffe’s formula into the base.</p><p>Jemma is also smart enough to know she can’t escape it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Up Jumped the Devil" by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds.

She’s somewhat distracted, what with trying _not_ to look at the frozen face of the Inhuman who tormented her _slash_ the dead face of the man who tortured her (and, goodness, her life has gotten strange, hasn’t it?) so she misses whatever prefaces Fitz’s horrified cry of, “Jemma!” She looks up, immediately abandoning her check of the gel matrix’s hold on Hive, and only manages a brief view of Fitz’s terror before an explosion behind her steals all her attention.

The recent shipment they received has burst open, releasing a white gas. Two agents, unfortunately close to the boxes, have already been swallowed by it and she can see through the haze the way their movements slow and stiffen, their profiles growing wider instead of thinner as they should when the mist envelopes them.

Jemma is very smart and very clever and it doesn’t take a genius to realize Hive is ahead of them. He’s used Daisy’s knowledge of SHIELD’s infrastructure to secret a time bomb holding Radcliffe’s formula into the base.

Jemma is also smart enough to know she can’t escape it. She looks back to Fitz with what she’s sure is a bittersweet sort of smile and allows herself to sit on the edge of Hive’s containment unit. Perhaps she might have been able to outrun the mist already hindering her view of Fitz’s retreat (he’s being dragged by Agent Grey, and she wishes she had the opportunity to thank the man for it), but she’s never fully recovered from her time on Maveth. Aside from the one disastrous mission to investigate NASA’s research into the monolith, she hasn’t even left the Playground since her return - outside of the occasional supply run, of course, and those always with May or Bobbi or Daisy to watch her.

To put it quite simply, she’s weak. Her muscles don’t know how to function under Earth’s gravity and her lungs aren’t sure how to breathe the air anymore and her heart is just _tired_. (Of course it’s possible that last has more to do with the news Fitz delivered on his return from the planet than with her own return.) So she won’t be making it safely out of the mist that is already sweet on her tongue; she can only hope, in her last few seconds of freedom, that Radcliffe manages to one day undo what he’s done.

The great, hulking shapes of the agents already transformed pass in front of her. She can see the eerily identical profiles and shudders to think that will soon be her. There’s a great deal of yelling from the far corners of the hangar and it only increases a moment later - they’re bringing more men back into the mist to force the transformation on them.

One of these poor agents lands nearly at Jemma’s feet. It’s Agent Spada and in only seconds her terrified face disappears behind the cocoon.

Confusion and curiosity have Jemma breathing deep. She’s been in the mist for nearly two minutes now. She wiggles her toes, holds up her hand before her face; the mist is thick but she doesn’t see any sign of a chrysalis forming.

Spada’s breaks open, revealing a face nearly indistinguishable from the rest. She climbs to her feet and bends close to Jemma, those beady eyes narrowing on her. Strong hands grip her upper arms and pull her to her feet - well _past_ her feet, in all honesty. Spada easily holds Jemma a full foot off the ground and carries her across the hangar to set her down next to the exploded boxes.

The mist has dispersed enough that she can see more than half a dozen agents have been transformed (it’s a small relief that Fitz doesn’t appear to be among them) and they’re gathering around the containment unit. Jemma considers whether she’d be capable of shooting one of her fellow agents - one who is unwilling in what they’re doing - if only she could reach the emergency box on the wall and its guns. The question still hangs in her mind when the bone-shaking banging begins. The new Inhumans are pounding the vibranium-reinforced glass holding Hive. Without solid data on the strength this breed of Inhumans possesses, Jemma can’t make an educated guess as to how long it will take them to break through - but her gut tells her it won’t be long at all.

Shoulds pile up in her head as more Inhumans join the effort and the fearsome racket continues to grow.

She _should_ find some way to stop them - but how without harming them? ICERs can’t even phase swayed Inhumans.

She _should_ run - but to where? The hangar is sealed tight; she doesn’t even know how Fitz managed to escape.

She _should_ \- She turns, realizing suddenly just where she is: directly next to the packages. And it is _packages_ , at least half a dozen boxes. Given how much of the mist has been released already, the others must carry enough of Radcliffe’s concoction to transform the entire base. She may not be able to escape or stop Hive being released, but she absolutely can find a way to stop them unleashing this on the rest of her friends.

The Inhumans are distracted trying to release Hive and none of them notice her darting behind the stack of boxes. The one that’s exploded is laid bare and she reaches right in, figuring the time for caution long past - and it’s not as though the mist hasn’t already done her all the harm it’s going to. (She doesn’t think about why she’s been unaffected; if she starts that, she fears she’ll never stop.)

Bombs aren’t her area of expertise, but the incendiary device seems to be a simple one, meant only to blow open the box as well as expose the two halves of the chemical formula to one another, allowing them to become the easily spread mist. Whether or not the other boxes are meant to explode open as this one did, they rest of the delivery system must be the same. If she can only prevent the chemicals from mixing successfully…

She looks around the hangar and, after some debate (jet fuel would certainly ruin the formula, but she’d rather not find out what effect such a powerful combustion would have on it if there are more explosives), settles on the fire extinguisher on the wall. It won’t be easy given how little muscle mass she has nowadays - just the thought of lifting the thing has her arms feeling sore - but it will _work_ and if it can save any of her friends, she has to try.

Fear must have lent her a burst of adrenaline because the extinguisher lifts easily from the wall and in a blink she's back beside the boxes. It takes a little tinkering to successfully feed the foam into the boxes without inadvertently setting something off - and in that time she hears the sounds of pounding dying down considerably - but in the end she’s successful. She manages to fill two boxes near to bursting and a third is nearly full when hands stronger than any normal human’s drag her back across the floor.

“Always causing trouble,” Hive says. She’s dropped at his feet while the Inhumans rush to unpack the undamaged boxes and salvage the others as best they can. (She hopes they can’t salvage them at all.)

She scampers back until she hits the side of a forklift after only a few feet. Hive smiles at her in a way that is far too familiar.

“You never know when to leave-” He cuts himself off. His face turns away and he winces as if in pain. His hands fist at his sides. “ _Coulson_ ,” he growls with so much feeling, her stomach churns in fear. When he opens his eyes, his smile is far less kind. “I’m having some trouble thinking clearly. I assume you know why?”

She nods stiffly, seeing no reason to waste energy defying him when he obviously already knows himself. “The memory machine.”

The side of his mouth she can see in profile pulls down distastefully. “It won’t kill me,” he says, and then smiles again. She’d really rather not know why.

The whirr of engines breaks the relative quiet of the quarantined hangar and Jemma looks up, wincing against the sunlight, to see a jet descending. Hive doesn’t seem surprised by the arrival, giving it only a cursory glance.

“Come,” he says and heads for Zephyr One.

She remains where she is and, after three paces, he stops to face her.

“ _Jemma_ ,” he says, warning in his voice, “I asked you to come with me.”

She lifts her chin. “And why would I go _anywhere_ with you?”

Again his smile is familiar, but this time it is at least familiar in a way she can stand. Grant Ward’s cruelty is at home on Hive’s face. He returns to her and drops to one knee to better face her. She shifts herself somewhat sideways, bringing her knees closer to the forklift than to him.

“Tell me,” he says, “you’ve been having trouble adjusting? Back on Earth longer than you were ever with me and you’re still weak, still tired.”

Her muscles tense, pulling her limbs tighter to her body. She wants to be small to escape the attention he’s fixed so firmly on her. She’s vaguely aware of the Inhumans disappearing with the canisters recovered from the boxes and of the jet landing on the other side of Zephyr One, but she can’t tear her eyes away from Hive to truly pay any of it mind.

He looks sad - truly, earnestly sad. It terrifies her.

“You haven’t guessed yet, have you?” he asks, reaching out to cup her cheek. Pressed so tightly back against the forklift as she is, there’s no room to escape his touch. “The human body can survive three days without water; how long did it take you to find that lake?”

She shakes her head as best she can with him holding her. “It was a little more but-”

“You were in a desert, exerting massive amounts of energy, and you hadn’t exactly prepared beforehand.” His thumb slides along her cheek and his fingers are curling just a little in her hair. It’s distracting. “I’m sorry, but you didn’t make it in time.”

“In time for what?” she demands. He can’t mean what he’s implied because that would mean that she …

He tips his head, apology disturbingly apparent on his face. “You died.”

It’s not possible. It’s _absurd_. So much so that she doesn’t think to fight him when he lifts his other hand to hold her face between them.

“But your mind was so _beautiful_ ,” he breathes with a brief smile. “And, I admit, you were the first woman I’d seen in millennia, I couldn’t let you die so needlessly. I brought you back.”

She shakes her head. Her back hurts where it presses into the edge of the forklift but she doesn’t care. He’s _insane_.

“My parasites are keeping you alive, have been almost since you arrived on Maveth. It’s a miracle they kept you going this long without me here.” His hands move to her shoulders and lift her, just as easily as Spada did earlier. Once she’s on her feet, he toys idly with her hair. “I’m sorry you won’t be able to join us. I’d hoped-” He shakes his head. “But Radcliffe says he can’t use my ‘dead’ blood for the catalyst; I suppose that means an equally dead body cannot transition.”

He presses his palms to the sides of her head and steps closer. So much for him being dead - the heat of him washes over her in a wave so strong it leaves her knees weak. She swallows reflexively as he bends to press his forehead to hers. Will used to do this. When the air of the caves was charged, made hot and sticky by their combined heat, in the quiet, desperate moment when their hips rolled against one another and they were both on the edge, he would press his forehead to hers and let his breath fall in warm puffs across her face.

Her heart aches with longing. (And with something that might be fear she was never truly alive to enjoy those stolen moments of happiness.)

“But don’t worry,” Hive says softly, “we’ll keep you close, keep you safe.”

His hands move to her arms, gripping her tightly. When he turns for Zephyr One, only one falls away, leaving the other to pull her along beside him. Giyera and that new Inhuman are supervising the loading of the warhead onto the plane - presumably they and it came from the jet - but she doesn’t think it was them Hive meant just now and the question of who he was talking about scares her more than the possibility he might be right.

 


	2. seven months later

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay this is a MAYBE future for this fic. It's definitely not what I had in mind when I originally wrote it, since this chapter contains spoilers for 4x04. But I got an itch to write something when I saw that episode and this came out. So it's a possible future, but not necessarily THE future. Okay? Okay.
> 
> Also. Obviously, **spoiler warning**.

The thin mattress beneath Jemma jumps, startling her awake.

“Sorry, sweetheart,” James says, sounding anything but, “were you sleeping?”

She doesn’t want to roll over. She doesn’t even want to be in the same room as him. She told Daisy he hates coming in even for his mandatory check-ins, but the truth is Jemma hates it just as much. She can’t stand to be near him, not after the events of last year.

Perhaps if she’d met him before, as Daisy had, but all her experiences with the man are tied up in that terrible time when she was… Well, she can’t be near him is the point. But as there’s a third person hovering in the shadows of the prison (it’s dank and dark and her left foot is chained, it’s a prison) he’s brought her to, a person who is plainly more than happy to distract her from James if only it means being acknowledged, she rolls over.

The view from this angle is no better. In fact, it’s worse. Before she had hope the thin light indicated windows as filthy as the rest of the room, but it turns out it’s only a single, bare bulb hanging over James’ head.

“Where are we?” she asks, swallowing down her fear. “And where’s Daisy?”

James shrugs - carefully, as he’s on his haunches - and says, “Some bloke with a flaming head took her - and no, that wasn’t a double entendre. Probably.”

Fantastic. The madman who burned an incorporeal man alive now has Daisy. Who knows what he’s planning on doing to her?

For that matter, what is James planning for Jemma?

“I suppose I’m the consolation prize?” she asks, looking to the heavy metal door that seems to be the only exit. Their companion wanders to it and, seeing her concern, gives it a push. As expected, it doesn’t budge.

“Too bad,” he says, sounding even less sorry than James. “It seems you’re stuck with us.”

She drags her eyes back to James. “A SHIELD scientist to make up to the Watchdogs your failure?”

He chuckles. “The Watchdogs are dead. The ones who were giving me a hand with Daisy, anyhow.”

Jemma gapes. “You- you killed them?” She doesn’t know why she’s so surprised. James is already a traitor, what’s another turn?

That twisted smile of his grows. “No. No, I did not.”

Well that’s ominous. She elects to ignore it in favor of more immediate concerns. The chain holding her to a pipe running from floor to ceiling a good meter away clinks as she curls her legs beneath her.

“Why am I here then? Daisy already removed your monitoring device.”

He lifts one finger towards her face and, knowing what he can do with a simple touch, it takes all her self-control not to recoil. His hand lowers, drawing a line in the air until it hovers in front of her stomach. Jemma looks down and finds three perfectly round holes in the fabric of her blouse. Her stomach feels suddenly hollow.

This is why she hates being around James. This feeling. She spent six terrible hours as Hive’s hostage and when she’s around James, the horrors of that period feel as fresh and present as they ever were. For the most part she’s capable of pretending it didn’t happen or, on her better days, accepting that it did while leaving it in the past. But with James that’s just not possible.

He never says or does anything - he’s as sensitive about that time as she is - but his mere presence is more than enough.

For the first time she willingly turns to face her other captor. He smiles, pleased.

“Daisy doesn’t know, does she?” James asks. His hand’s fallen away to hang limply over his knee. He looks almost sorry. “She wasn’t part of the hive when he took you, she doesn’t understand what you were to him … what he was to you.”

“We weren’t anything to each other,” she snaps. “Anything other than kidnapper and kidnap victim, that is. And I don’t see that it matters because-”

“Do you see him in your nightmares? Your dreams?” He grabs her chin, forcing her to look at him when she wants nothing more than to hide the shame she feels. Over his shoulder the other man scowls, angry James would be so rough with her. James frowns. “Do you see him now?”

“Yes, Jemma,” Hive says, his fingers brushing softly over her cheek. “Do you see me?” It’s a wonder James doesn’t recoil. Or it would be, if Jemma was a touch more addled than she is.

James’ hand drops and he stands, a look of revulsion curling his features. “I’m sorry. I really am.”

“Why am I here?” Jemma presses while James backs towards the door. Her window of opportunity to get some answers is swiftly closing.

“You’re not an Inhuman,” he says. “If you were, SHIELD’d know and they’d have one of those watches on you. So if it’s not you, it’s him.”

“What is?” she asks and no sooner has she said it than she’s following it up with, “He’s dead.”

And he _is_. No matter that he’s tipping his head to one side and giving her those puppy dog eyes, acting hurt that she’d deny him.

James points, again to her stomach. She knows she can’t, not with the air so still, but she imagines she can feel air moving through the holes. She tries not to think about the dried blood around them.

“I didn’t kill the Watchdogs,” he says. “But after they shot you … I saw Hive devour plenty of people and I saw it happen again today.”

“No,” Jemma says. Because it’s not true. It _can’t_ be true. She jumps to her feet. “No, that’s not possib-”

“Then how are you alive?”

Her protests evaporate.

“He was keeping you alive before and he’s still doing it now.” James really does look sorry now, as he opens the door and steps back through it. “And I think we both know you’re doing the same for him.”

She shakes her head. She’s not. She would _never_. Warmth presses along her back and broad hands curl around her hips. “Ah, but you never had a choice, did you, my Jemma?”

She closes her eyes against him.

“I’m so sorry,” James says. “We’ll find a way to end your pain too.”

The door closes with a heavy clang. Her eyes snap open on the sound and she finds herself alone, with only a ghost for company.

 


End file.
